Q&A: Lauren Friedman

Lauren Friedman’s creative journey started with a lifelong passion for clothing, a dull 9-t0-5 job and an outfit idea doodled one evening. That little sketch evolved into Lauren’s popular blog, My Closet In Sketches, where she illustrates and collages her fashion inspirations and tips. Now, in addition to running herblog and illustrating outfits for Lucky Magazine, this busy gal has released 50 Ways to Wear a Scarf, a beautifully illustrated guide to the versatility of one of Lauren’s favorite accessories. We can never resist a great new tntake on fashion—nor pass up a good scarf-tying tutorial—so we peeked inside Lauren’s studio and asked her to share her thoughts on fashion, illustration and her fabulous book. Along with answering our questions, Lauren wanted our readers to be the first to see the brand new book trailer for 50 Ways To Wear a Scarf!

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Can you tell us about 50 Ways to Wear a Scarf?I illustrated and wrote over fifty ways to wear a scarf (and unbelievably, I keep thinking of more!), and each look in this book is shown with my own scarves and clothes. While I was writing it, I honestly forgot that anyone besides my editor and me would ever read it—so the voice, sense of humor and fashion sense are very authentically mine. Every person who holds this book is absolutely holding a piece of me.

What inspired you to create the book?From the time I was able to put on my own shirt, I have created a story around getting dressed: the ballerina who marries a rapper and runs away to the countryside is always a favorite, but I also love to be the anthropologist from Boston who moves to the desert, or the grandmommy with a fondness for track jackets and gold chains. I think that scarves are like exclamation points; they add the final flourish to these daily narratives of getting dressed. I want to show readers that you can tell a million stories when wearing a scarf—and the bolder, the better!

What was your favorite part of creating 50 Ways to Wear a Scarf?My favorite part was getting lost in the creation of the whole thing. It was a hard effort, to be sure, but I honestly loved the process of slogging through something bigger than I’ve ever done before. I thought about scarves all day and dreamt about scarves all night.